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MIAMI, May 24 (AP) — Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis entered the 2024 presidential race Wednesday in a crowded Republican primary that will test his national appeal as a culturally conservative firebrand. power and whether the Republican Party is willing to take over the trump card from former President Donald.
The 44-year-old Republican revealed his decision in a Federal Election Commission filing ahead of an online conversation with Twitter CEO Elon Musk.
It marks a new chapter in his extraordinary rise from little-known congressman to two-term governor to a leading figure in the nation’s bitter fight over race, gender, abortion and other divisive issues.
DeSantis is considered Trump’s strongest Republican opponent, even as the governor faces questions about his readiness to enter the national stage.
DeSantis’ audio-only announcement will air on Twitter Spaces beginning at 6:00 p.m. ET.
He subsequently made prime-time appearances on conservative programming, including on Fox News and on Mark Levin’s radio show.
DeSantis has been rumored to enter the Republican field for months, and he is considered one of the party’s strongest candidates to retake the White House from Democratic President Joe Biden.
Republicans say the 80-year-old incumbent has pushed the country too far left without addressing inflation, immigration and crime.
The Republican candidate will face Biden on the November 2024 general election ballot.
DeSantis started his campaign alongside Trump, based on early public voting, fundraising and campaign infrastructure.
These two Republican powerhouses have a lot in common.
DeSantis likely wouldn’t have become Florida’s governor without Trump’s endorsement, adopting the former president’s fiery personality, his populist policies and even some of his rhetoric and mannerisms.
Yet DeSantis has one thing Trump doesn’t: He has a credible argument that he might be more likely to be elected in the general election than Trump, who faces multiple legal threats and is in a row. Three years of national elections presided over Republican defeats.
Just six months ago, DeSantis won re-election in Florida by a stunning 19 percentage points — even as Republicans in many other states struggled. He also scored several major policy victories during the spring session of the Republican-controlled legislature.
Aware of DeSantis’ draw, Trump has for months focused almost exclusively on undermining DeSantis’ political appeal. Trump and his team believe that DeSantis may be Trump’s only legitimate threat to the nomination.
Trump’s kitchen sink attacks and epithets won’t be DeSantis’ only roadblock.
DeSantis may be a political heavyweight in Florida and a regular on Fox News, but allies acknowledge that most primary voters in other states don’t know him well.
A native of Midwestern Florida, DeSantis studied and played baseball at Yale University. He would go on to Harvard Law School and become a Naval Advocate General, a post that took him to Iraq and the Guantanamo Bay internment camp.
He ran for Congress in 2012 and won the Orlando area district, becoming a founding member of the far-right Freedom Caucus on Capitol Hill.
Despite his lengthy résumé, friends and foes alike have noted that DeSantis struggles to project the charisma and quick thinking that typically characterize successful candidates at the national level.
He went to great lengths during his tenure as governor to avoid impromptu public appearances and media scrutiny, which would have been difficult, if not impossible, as a presidential candidate.
Potential supporters are also concerned that DeSantis has refused to invest in relationships with party leaders or other elected officials, raising questions about his ability to build the coalition needed to ultimately defeat Trump. The more personable Trump, by contrast, has rallied large numbers of support in key states, including Florida.
Aside from the primaries, DeSantis’ biggest long-term challenge may lie in the far-right policies he enacted as governor as an unapologetic leader in what he called a “wake-up” war.
Florida’s governor sent dozens of migrants from Texas to Martha’s Vineyard off the coast of Massachusetts to draw attention to an influx of Latino migrants trying to cross the U.S.-Mexico border.
He signed and expanded the Parents’ Rights in Education Act — dubbed by critics the “Don’t Talk Gay” law, which bans the teaching or classroom discussion of LGBTQ issues in Florida public schools of all grades.
Most recently, he signed a law banning abortions after six weeks, before most women realize they’re pregnant. He single-handedly ousted an elected prosecutor who had vowed not to bring charges against people under Florida’s new abortion restrictions or doctors who provided gender-affirming care.
DeSantis also signed a law this year allowing Florida residents to carry concealed firearms without a permit. He has introduced new measures that experts warn will erode press freedom. He also took control of a liberal arts college that he believed was indoctrinating students to the left.
The governor’s most high-profile political fight, however, has been against Florida-based entertainment giant Disney, which has spoken out against his “don’t say gay” law. In retaliation, DeSantis took control of Disney World’s governing body and installed loyalists who threatened to take over park planning, among other extraordinary measures.
DeSantis himself has threatened to build a state prison on the park’s land.
The dispute drew condemnation from business leaders and his Republican opponents, who said the moves ran counter to small-government conservatism.
DeSantis delayed his announcement until the end of Florida’s legislative session. But for much of this year, he has been courting primary voters in key states and using a joint super PAC to build a large political organization that is essentially a campaign in waiting and has already At least $30 million was demanded from the bank.
The field he joins already includes: Trump; former U.N. ambassador Nikki Haley; South Carolina Sen. Tim Scott; former Arkansas Gov. Asa Hutchinson; and biotech entrepreneur Vivek Ramaswamy. Former Vice President Mike Pence has also been considered a possible presidential candidate, but has yet to announce a bid.
Thanks to a months-long effort by super PACs to install campaign infrastructure in Iowa, New Hampshire, Nevada and South Carolina, DeSantis has more political power than any of his opponents, with the possible exception of Trump. , are more likely to start operating, and those places will host the first four games on the primary Republican calendar early next year.
The Super PAC has also established more than 30 DeSantis student chapters in at least 18 states. (Associated Press)
(This is an unedited and auto-generated story from a Syndicated News feed, the content body may not have been modified or edited by LatestLY staff)
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